June 20, 2011

The court ruled unanimously that the lawsuit against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. cannot proceed as a class action, reversing a decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. The lawsuit could have involved up to 1.6 million women, with Wal-Mart facing potentially billions of dollars in damages....

The justices divided 5-4 on another aspect of the ruling that could make it much harder to mount similar class-action discrimination lawsuits against large employers.

Justice Antonin Scalia’s opinion for the court’s conservative majority said there needs to be common elements tying together “literally millions of employment decisions at once.”

But Scalia said that in the lawsuit against the nation’s largest private employer, “That is entirely absent here.”

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing for the court’s four liberal justices, said there was more than enough uniting the claims. “Wal-Mart’s delegation of discretion over pay and promotions is a policy uniform throughout all stores,” Ginsburg said.

I hope the GOP candidates for President are smart and articulate enough to use this case in their argument against electing the Democratic President to a second term.

I think plaintiffs are trying to say that if headquarters can see a pattern of women doing poorly under the decentralized discretion system, then keeping that system in place is a discriminatory policy. That absence of centralized control is the common issue that makes it an appropriate class action (rather than lot of individual cases that ought to be brought separately if at all).

So... the thing that makes a million individuals the same is that they... are different. They should have been made the same.... or more alike... by a sex-discrimination-conscious policy. I think it's possible to get your head around that idea, but nearly impossible to picture workable legal doctrine governing the real-world affairs of human beings... including the judges who would apply it.

ALSO: I'm reading Justice Scalia's assessment of the "social framework" analysis that the plaintiffs offered to prove that Wal-Mart had "a general policy of discrimination" (which was supposed to be the common question supporting the class action form of litigation):

[Dr. William] Bielby testified that Wal-Mart has a “strong corporate culture,” that makes it “ ‘vulnerable’ ” to “gender bias.” Id., at 152. He could not, however, “determine with any specificity how regularly stereotypes play a meaningful role in employment decisions at Wal-Mart. At his deposition … Dr. Bielby conceded that he could not calculate whether 0.5 percent or 95 percent of the employment decisions at Wal-Mart might be determined by stereotyped thinking.” 222 F. R. D. 189, 192 (ND Cal. 2004)....“[W]hether 0.5 percent or 95 percent of the employment decisions at Wal-Mart might be determined by stereotyped thinking” is the essential question on which respondents’ theory of commonality depends. If Bielby admittedly has no answer to that question, we can safely disregard what he has to say.

AND: I've written a new post to help you understand the way in which this was not a unanimous decision.

I'm really bothered by CNN.com's "breaking news" article on the case- it states that the case failed because the class is "simply too large." This is no even close to an accurate description of the case. "Large" is not the same thing as "broad" or "diverse."

But now there are 400+ comments (representing who knows how many readers), mostly from poorly informed individuals who see no reason to question it, and will go through life thinking that SCOTUS believes that discrimination is just fine if the class is "large."

Shameful. If CNN can't even begin to understand the case, it really shouldn't report on it until it can.

- Lyssa

(I know that it's a breaking news article, which is usually preliminary, but this was a big case and someone should have seen fit to figure out the issues before the ruling went down.)

So basically, Ginsberg just said "The very fact that they did not have a policy, but pushed decision-making down to the store level, is proof that they had a policy at the top of promoting sexism..."

...because how? Because all male managers, and most female ones, are by definition so sexist they don't have to even be encouraged to follow their innate sexist instincts? Just letting them run things on their own will, by definition, produce illegal discrimination in the workplace of 2011?

That's the centralized-government attitude in a nutshell-- you're all criminals only being restrained from running amuck by the firm, sane hand of regulation and prosecution.

I wonder how many times the dissents in such cases do not reflect how the justice would have resolved the case but instead are to signal to their base that he or she understands their concerns. In this case, since the conservative justices had voted to block the lawsuit against Wal-Mart, the liberal justices were "free" to advocate for a position that pleased their supporters -- no matter how unworkable that position would have been had it carried the day. This way the liberal justices get to say to their friends, "See, we hate Wal-Mart and care about women's rights." However, given the practical problems with implementing their professed legal theory, I wonder if they would have supported that theory had their vote been decisive.

Note: I'm not suggesting that only liberal justices might engage in this behavior. These dissents reminded me of the question, so it's in this context that I raise the possibility. In Congress, it's not uncommon for members on the right and on the left to vote for or against bills for signaling purposes when the outcome of the vote is secure. I'm just wondering if the same behavior occurs at the Supreme Court and, if so, how often.

Michael just said:"So basically, Ginsberg just said "The very fact that they did not have a policy, but pushed decision-making down to the store level, is proof that they had a policy at the top of promoting sexism..."

...because how? Because all male managers, and most female ones, are by definition so sexist they don't have to even be encouraged to follow their innate sexist instincts? Just letting them run things on their own will, by definition, produce illegal discrimination in the workplace of 2011?

That's the centralized-government attitude in a nutshell-- you're all criminals only being restrained from running amuck by the firm, sane hand of regulation and prosecution.

You are presumed guilty."

And I have to say I agree with Michael completely on that. The only "centralized" policy at Wal-Mart was to let EACH store evaluate the employees at such store.

Ginsberg's dissent is chilling. It is an argument FOR authoritarianism:

“The practice of delegating to supervisors large discretion to make personnel decisions, uncontrolled by formal standards, has long been known to have the potential to produce disparate effects,” she wrote. “Managers, like all humankind, may be prey to biases of which they are unaware.”

If an organization decentralizes authority with some (some) adverse effects the adverse effects adhere to the organization as if they were centrally planned. The organization can only respond by centralizing the authority it had distributed and exerting the control it had passed to smaller groups and individuals.

Ginsberg would demand that Walmart be the large, impersonal, authoritarian organization that liberals already imagine it to be.

We also conclude that respondents’ claims for backpay were improperly certified under Federal Rule of CivilProcedure 23(b)(2). Our opinion in Ticor Title Ins. Co. v. Brown, 511 U. S. 117, 121 (1994) (per curiam) expressed serious doubt about whether claims for monetary relief may be certified under that provision. We now hold that they may not, at least where (as here) the monetary reliefis not incidental to the injunctive or declaratory relief.

What it means is that the Court found unanimously that Wal Mart won and that the employees' class action was inappropriate. It also means that WalMart's win was neither "conservative" nor "liberal".

The part of the decision that was divided could have gone either way and WalMart still would have won.

The primary reasons why Obama must be defeated is the damage to this country if 1) the SCOTUS shifts to the left further, and 2) Obamacare implementation.

I agree completely. I think that an Obama defeat is going to be devastating. It will set back race relations immensely- I believe that we will still hear griping about how America treated the first black president for 25 years or more. It was enough that, in the beginning, I was considering the idea that a second term might be for the best. But then I think of Antoin Scalia's 75 year old heart. The possibilty of decades of a truely liberal court, unconstrained and unchecked, would be too much.

If the Supreme Court was totally in the hands of the Democratic Liberals there probably wouldn't be any business or industry left in our country. The only thing the Libs want to do is right imagined wrongs against the proletariat workers and the end result of same would be nobody working in private industry at all.

Seems like if one worker is(allegedly discriminated against) then they all are slighted???

Okay, after some more research, my understanding is that it was unanimous that the plaintiffs failed to show that this was a valid class. The 4 liberals wanted to remand to give them a shot at showing why the class was valid, and the 5 conservatives decided that there was no way this could ever be a valid class, and thus ended the case.

There are two threshold requirements for class actions under federal rules of civil procedure Rule 23(a) and Rule 23(b).

The Five Justices in the majority ruled that the Wal-Mart class didn't meet the first hurdle, rule 23(a), because there was not a single common question that bound all 1.5 million potential class members. The four justices in the minority disagreed with that ruling.

If a proposed class meets the requirements of Rule 23(a), it must also satisfy Rule 23(b), which provides for three types of classes (b)(1); (b)(2); and (b)(3). The Wal-Mart plaintiffs tried to get the class certified as a (b)(2) class, for injunctive relief (essentially an order telling Wal-Mart not to discriminate any more. But (b)(2) classes are not for monetary relief, which plaintiffs sought here. The Court was unanimous that the class could not be certified under (b)(2).

Justice Ginsberg wrote that it was possible that the class could be certified under (b)(3), which requires that questions common to the class predominate over questions that would require individual determination. She would have remanded for the lower court to rule on that question.

Under the majority's reasoning, however, because there was no common question at all, there was no way that common questions could predominate over individual questions, and therefore a (b)(3) class would fail as well.

Supreme Court nominations is why I vote Republican. I feel like we're just hanging on by our fingernails before there's a liberal SCOTUS and we drop into the abyss.

Prepare for disappointment. The GOP has done great work helping the left use the courts to ratchet things to the left, even as it waves the bloody shirt of liberal judges to win elections.

Many cases could be cited, but Roe v. Wade works pretty well, given how comprehensive it was in it's legal and political effect. The original Roe v. Wade and companion Doe decisions were handed down 7-2; of that court, White, Marshall and Douglas were Democrats; five of the six Republicans joined two Democrats in the Roe decision, including three named by Nixon, who ran against liberal judges.

OK, just an aberration? Fast forward to the rematch, the 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey decision. This time, the Court upheld Roe 5-4; all FIVE of this majority were Republican nominees, three of them (O'Connor, Kennedy and Souter) by Reagan and Bush. Reagan, the most conservative president since Coolidge--gave us three Supreme Court picks, two of which voted to uphold Roe.

Now, someone could point to Bush (II)'s picks--but we don't know yet how they'll rule on Roe, so we can't compare them on this line of jurisprudence. It may be that Bush Jr. will have vindicated hopes that a GOP president can be counted on in this area--except remember Harriet Myers.

To attain what you want, I suggest focusing on Congress, not on the Presidency. Reagan picked Kennedy because he lost Bork in the Senate; Bush picked Alito because the pressure from the Senate was coming from the right at that time.

Heck, improve the Senate enough, and we might get another Byron White.

Ann, perhaps I'm missing something here; it wasn't the government that brought the lawsuit."

That's really not the point. This case highlights how liberals believe every business decision should be subject to government approval. Wal-Mart is a good PR case because they meld normally disaparate interest groups.

Free marketers and pro-business voters support anyone in Wal-Mart's circumstance. Middle and lower income Americans understand the left is attacking their cheapest shopping option.

The long term solution is to populate the law school faculties with more professors with a sensible outlook. The Ginsburgs and the Sumis learned their judicial philosophies at school, Ginsburg when her point of view was somewhat exotic, Sumi when it had become conventional wisdom among the faculty.

The liberal takeover of academia will continue to have influence and consequences. Does anyone believe that Althouse would be evaluated by search committees at "elite" law schools without consideration of her less than perfectly pc political views revealed here? Not a chance. I'll bet she would even have trouble passing muster at Montana Law School.

TMan is right that the Ginsburg analysis would have allowed the plaintiffs to fight another day for class certification under b3. As a practical matter, though, plaintiffs would have had a difficult time establishing that common questions predominated over those requiring individual determination even under the Ginsburg analysis.

Alex, by and large 18 year olds don't vote. They don't want to be called in for jury duty. Which usually goes out to college kids, for finals week.

As to Blacks, there's a good chance lots of them won't vote.

We're not in 2008. Where McCain was such a putz, it was easy to pick Obama, just by comparison. Dubya, back then, had a popularity rating dumping into the toilet at 31%.

2012, at this time, just shows ya the weaknesses still inherent in the GOP. Especially in the senate. With the chinless wonder, McConnell trying to act like LBJ. Believes in upping the debt limit. Is against cutting what should have been trimmed and cut long ago.

Since both parties provide dogs. It's probable that 2012 will open the gate on an Independent run.

If that happens? You'll see media heads exploding. For Sarah Palin, this is a benefit!

Lots of benefits if you just avoid the pundits. Whose popularity is in the sewer. Scoring points below Dubya. As he exited in 2008.

I'm always looking for surprises.

Up ahead? I'm looking to see germans tossing Merkel out on her rear end. And, watching the EURO, not exactly going up in smoke. But sans the germans. Just as it is currently sans the British Pound.

What could happen to the EURO? It drops in value. It fits the schmucks who are screaming and yelling in greece. Because as the worth of the EURO drops, so, too, does the debts owed back to banks. Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of banksters.

Once the EURO flies down ... the rest is only "clean up." Of course, I can't guarantee a thing. The future is unknown-unknown. Buy why do you fear t'marra, if you don't fear today?

I read the dissent, but not the majority decision, but what is a bit scary to me is J. Ginsburg's concentration on disparate impact.

Disparate impact is code for equality of results, regardless of equality of qualifications, effort, and dedication. And, not surprisingly, the three women on the court voted to essentially give women the advantage over men in this regard, rewarding them for not working as many hours over as many years, not being willing to relocate, etc.

Equality of results in the form of disparate impact is scary stuff. Governments have tried it, and the result is that they end up paying pink collar jobs far above prevailing market rates in order to compensate for the higher pay in blue collar jobs, that tend to be far more dangerous and strenuous. What they never really adequately answer is why do those blue collar jobs pay more than the pink collar ones in the open market.

Ginsburg seemed to think that Wal-Mart's requirement that store level management relocate was somehow discriminatory against women. She never addressed or likely even considered that the policy was intentionally conceived for specific purposes (primarily, I believe, so that management was able to see how more stores were run, and not get overly committed to local practices), and that by all evidence seems to work. No, her only interest was that it discriminates against women, in general, in its results. Not against any one woman, but on average, all women. Never mind that the manager who does relocate is likely to do a better job as a result.

At the supreme-o's. Going into Monday Conferences, the only ones in the room are the nine justices, themselves.

The last one seated (in this case kagan). Is the one who serves the others their coffee.

That's the rule. Because the 9 justices debate in secret. Their votes are unknown to the public.

The first view anyone gets of who the justices are thinking is when there's orals. And, even then, some justices shoot out questions to fool the press.

The real problem is with orin hatch. He's the senator who controls who gets promoted. And, who does not.

Bork wasn't worth the political damage. Reagan was the kind of leader who could read tea leaves. With Bork gone he put in Alito, I think.

The hearings are televised. Bork won himself no friends. Alito did.

The hardest justice to sit was Clarence Thomas. That's when the left went nuts! To them, being on the right is racist! They pulled out all their pubic hair guns to shoot at Thomas. And, failed to make a case.

A few years later on ... Bill Clinton would be found to have diddled with an intern. Using his cigars. He got sympathy from the RIGGINGS of the propaganda machine that has become our MSM.

/Seinfeld. Nothing wrong with that.

But no one ever apologized to Thomas. He, and Antonin Scalia, do a lot with their pens.

I didn't read the dissent, so this involvs some baldfaced assuming on my part, but still:

Why does a requirement that managers re-locate discriminate against *women* specifically? Women and men are physically equally able to move locations and travel.

I see this sort of thing a lot on women-centered career sites, and it makes me sick. I assume that the alleged reason that moving stores is bad for women is that they have children to care for and husbands' jobs to consider, while men can move at will. I see similar allegations that not having on-site day care or having long work hours are discriminatory towards women on a regular basis.

No. If a woman decides to put her career before her family, or her family before her career, so be it. If a man decides the same, so be it. Either party is equally able to determine the roles that they would like to play, and each *family* must decide who's career takes center stage. If you're a woman and your family responsibilities are holding you back, talk to your husband. It's not your employer's fault that you have a family problem. To keep acting like family is simply a woman's issue is to keep demanding different, unequal, treatment of women in the workforce. Stop it.

It's not up to Scott M's vote to turn the tide in any future election.

Geez.

All I am saying, from the array of doofuses the GOP has collected, it's hardly likely that any one of them can collect enough popular votes to win.

This doesn't stop a ONE NATION tour. This doesn't stop Sarah Palin from deciding if she'd like to try an Independent run.

1992, which saw the tossing of a sitting president, Bush the elder ... was won by Bill Clinton. In a plurality. After Ross Perot collapsed his changes by quitting before election day. He tried to remount this horse.

So, yes. There's an outcome there, just looking at you.

Also, after Teddy Roosevelt (the first progressive), running as a Bull Moose ... where he came in 2nd. And, the republican incumbent, Taft, came in 3rd. We got Woodrow Wilson. (Straight from Princeton, I think.)

Then we got the GOP back in the saddle with Harding. Who nominated Taft to the supreme-O's.

After Hoover, we got the FDR run. Which galloped forward for more than 60 years.

Oh, yeah. Before Roe, abortions were done in back alleys. Lots of women died. Or were left sterile.

And, women who were unwed where shamed into giving up their children to adoption.

That's in the past. It's not going to come back.

And, abortion is the last refuge of religious zealots. Doesn't bring in independent voters.

Just tuned into the Rush Limbaugh show and he's talking about Operation Gunwalker/Fast and Furious. MSM won't be able to ignore the story forever.

I know that this is off topic, but this is a far bigger story than the Wal-Mart one.

In summary ATF, apparently under the full knowledge and maybe instigation of their recess-appointed head, intentionally expedited purchase of several thousand AK variant (i.e. semi-automatic versions) in order to track the weapons, which they were unable to do until they were found at crime scenes primarily in Mexico. At least one US federal agent was killed by one of these guns, as well as hundreds of Mexican police and maybe a thousand or more civilians.

There is a lot of evidence that the program was run at least at the agency director level, but there some evidence that high level political appointees in the Justice Department also knew, were routinely briefed,and may have even encourage it. Maybe not to the Holder level, but at least to one or two levels down.

In any case, Rep. Issa has been having hearings and the DoJ under AG Holder is in full stone-wall and cover-up mode - worse than anything we saw under Nixon. This is potentially the biggest scandal of our lifetimes (no one died in the Watergate burglaries), and it is being intentionally suppressed by the mainstream media.

Imagine the turmoil should one of the conservative justices health fail during the current administration.

An interesting thought experiment would be to consider what would President Obama do should a lone nut violent act took away one a Scalia, or Thomas.

The honorable thing would be to nominate a similar conservative (of similar age), so as not give undue political influence to the act of an assassin. Hard to imagine Obama being honorable given that opportunity (or progressives counseling him to do so).

The left-wing hate for Wal-mart is like their hate for Palin. In both cases they decided they hated someone or something and then looked for reasons to justify that hate. Then being unable to find any reasonable justification they started making things up. Here they made up a policy of discrimination in the clear absence of any such policy and in Palin's case they manufactured conspiracies involving her womb going rogue and claiming her daughter's child as its own.

An interesting thought experiment would be to consider what would President Obama do should a lone nut violent act took away one a Scalia, or Thomas.

The Masses will have spoken twice:1) In the (re)election of Obama; and2) In their decision to retire some Justices early.Clearly the only honourable thing to do would be to replace any assassinated Justice with Van Jones.

This was an expected decision as on the whole it is difficult to show structural discrimination in large organizations unless you have specific memos as for example were evidenced when there was a quota system for Jews in higher education. Now it will be interesting to see how the individual cases play out.And who will every be able to prove intentions when passed over for a promotion because a fellow member of the Core club was picked over them?

I will agree with that. And, yes, more Americans died at Waco as a result of the ATF than have in the current scandal (though the overall fatality count is much higher in the later, by a factor of maybe 10).

But I see this one as worse, because it was apparently instigated and perpetuated by the political appointees and resisted by the career employees. In the case of Waco, it appears that it was instigated and perpetuated primarily by career employees, and AG Reno only made her fateful decision based on intentionally false information being fed her by those career employees. And most of us know better than to give weapons to non-military government personnel. (It has gotten so bad, that the Department of Education now has its own SWAT team for going after people who don't pay their student loans).

Could women of the future sue the Supreme Court for making women look soft-headed via the "reasoning" of the female justices on the Supreme Court?

It doesn't really help the feminist cause when a bunch of supposed feminists are out there arguing that women need all sorts of special helps. "By virtue of being women, women are disabled, and that is not fair, so we must help them." Gee, thanks.

Knowing garage's penchant for content-free snark, Pogo, I expect he's crafting some too-clever-by-half riposte about "arms for hostages" or some other variant of "you didn't think it was illegal when Rethuglicans did it, so there, nyah, nyah."

Joe the 3 things on your list are not equal. They're just not the same!

This mexico gang thing is long overdue. Time the cartels rid themselves of some of their gangster competition.

Bet'cha it's a story without legs.

It would be different, if we decided to build a fence at our southern border. But there are five states involved: California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. (You can't even resolve issues "down there" between ranchers and farmers.)

Sympathy for the mexicans? Nope. Just like the arabs. They're all enemies now.

While the most interesting thing I've learned, given how hard it is for any oriental to get a visa to America ... The Chinese are now landing, in droves, in Mexico. And, comfortably crossing over into the States. Using Mexican paperwork. They apply. And, it is easily obtained.

Probably, it's just like our dollars. Printed by the Feds. Each state just distributes this through banks. No one is demanding "state coins." (And, no. Our fancy quarters don't count. That was just to make sales to collectors. Who save. And, who do not spend.)

The ATF ain't going anywhere.

And, neither is weiner. He has yet to resign. STOP BELIEVING WHAT YOU READ IN THE PAPERS!

The MSM game is RIGGED. (That's why they've suffered losses in revenue. And, more subscribers and viewers than you could throw a book at.)

Considering how well your “campaign” has gone so far Mein Fuhrer are you sure you wish to be issuing taunts like that out? So far Walker and his agenda have prospered and you have not….or is humility or the ability to see which way the wind blows beyond you, and truly one DOES need to be a weatherman to see which way the wind is blowing?

Liberty means Wal-Mart and any large corporation playing by any rules they feel benefit them. I'm pretty sure that's in the Constitution too.

I ask in all sincerity, Garage, have you ever worked for a 'large corporation'? I work for a business entity that in our immediate stead, employs 400 people. All together, across our global network and our affiliates, we employ at least 10,000 people.

Even in the 400-person workplace, it is often that the right hand doesn't really know what the left hand is up to.

Our NYC office does some things completely differently than we do in Ohio. Policy is nebulous at best.

A moderate level of autonomy is built into the structure, as I'm guessing it is with the way Wal Mart management is built.

So Carol, I suspect your claim "... abortion is the last refuge of religious zealots. Doesn't bring in independent voters." is a way to deny how unpopular abortion really is. What does that make defenders of abortion?

I'm not sure I get your drift about WalMart shoppers and Democrats and the left. While they might be in a lower income bracket than other stores clientele, does that necessarily make them Democratic or left? A bargain shopping is a bargain.

I thought one of the strengths of the Wal-Mart company was the discretion local store managers were given. I can't imagine a store where the HVAC was controlled by central office, two time-zones away. After Katrina the local Wal-Marts were very supportive of survivors. Story is at one store the manager directed a piece of heavy equipment to knock down the wall to the pharmacy, to get at needed medicine. Managers without authority don't do stuff like that.

So the decision hinged completely on Dr. Bielby's testimony? Bielby f*cked up by not providing sufficient evidence of discrimination or that the discrimination was not "similar" enough, or some BS, and thus Il Duce can toss the claims of a million women workers in the sh*thole. Fuggetaboutit!

My experience is that men are more likely to be dicriminated against. At one time, I worked for a large corporation that had hiring "goals". When it got time to "reorganize", it was almost all white males who were "impacted" and found themselves unemployed. I don't think senior mgmt said "get rid of white males so we can meet our diversity goals", but it was more done on the mid-level mgmt. When a manager is told to reduce headcount in his/her department, it is easier to fire a white guy then one from Africa or a lady employee.

What seems particulary encouraging about this decision is that the majority, toward the end of the decision, appear to be questioning some basic disparate impact dogma.

That is, it's not just that the class cannot be certified, but, the mere fact that statistical disparities in results necessarily imply discrimination (or at least that such disparities would shift the burden of proof onto Wal-Mart) seems to be questioned here.

My wife runs a call center. By far and away, the least envious "type" to be is a white male. While the rank and file never see the sausage being made in HR, my wife is privy to endless machinations between her work force, HR, and the corporate legal team.

Should any sort of HR situation arise, the "protected classes" require six times the man-hours to process. The possibility for negative outcomes, from the employee's point of view, is much reduced.

My advice to a white male in such a situation? Make sure HR thinks you're gay. Either than or cut off a leg (just during work hours).

Scott M, funny you should mention the gay thing. This same company had "goals" on hiring gay guys. I always found that bizzare. To go to an event sponsored by the gay crowd, set up a booth because they thought that gays would be better employees than non-gay types. Imagine if they would have gone to a Christian rally and set up a hiring booth.

Not sure what you're basing that on. Walker wouldn't be elected today if he ran. It's been proven there are plenty of people available that want to see recalls. Walker won't be getting anymore popular once people start seeing the education and Medicaid cuts take effect.

Walker won't be getting anymore popular once people start seeing the education and Medicaid cuts take effect.

Wow, and those “cuts” are going to look like what Garage? That my son’s teacher has to pay more for health care and retirement? Will the teacher, be less able to teach? Or is the teacher passing those “cuts” onto my son?

Again, considering how well you’ve seen the future are you SURE you want to be discussing this?

Let's just say that Governor Walker is recalled and a liberal Democrat gets put in. It will be just like Obama, who lied and lied and lied about:

-Ending illegal warrantless domestic spying-Shutting down Gitmo-Civil trials for terrorists-Ending wars in Iraq and Afgan-He expanded wars to Pakistan and Libya, and without congressional approval-cutting the deficit

If a Democrat gets into the governors office, he will do the same things Governor Walker is doing. Why do you think Diamond Jim Doyle didn't run again?

Are you saying that education spent $2 Billion last year and will only spend ONE BILLION next year, or that Education was Programmed to receive 3 Billion next year and will only receive only 2 Billion, after spending 1.8 Billion the last year? A “cut” has to be defined. Please define it.

we should just end public edu-ma-cation altogether, 'cept for some...Teabagger studies, brutthrr. You know, some wrenchin', weapons-manufacturing, Ayn Rand, a little of the Fuhrer, meth cookin', then some bible studies--have it all taught by some nice ladies from the church. Won't it be fine.

The WI libertarians have whined for months about educators getting pensions and health care--they have yet to squeak about cops or firemen's pensions and HC. So like come on Joey Crypto-Kissinger---belly up to the bar, and start bullying the cops and firefighters, and their pensions and HC, tough guy. Or vets.

The deficit's due mostly to defense spending, Alex. The DoD itself more than 1/3 of the entire Fed budget--the GOP-TP-led House just approved of a 700 billion DoD "appropriations" bill--will pass in Senate. Some budget trimmers there. Ayn Rand herself, that skanky, greedy witch, would not approve.

They got many innocent foriegners killed. They tried to frame innocent US citizens for it.

Does anyone here remember a year or so ago, when the DoJ/ATF was flogging statistics showing how many guns in Mexico had come from the U.S. What we didn't know was that some of those guns that they were talking about were being allowed to cross by the very agency that was telling us about how many of them were going south.

The deficit's due mostly to defense spending, Alex. The DoD itself more than 1/3 of the entire Fed budget--the GOP-TP-led House just approved of a 700 billion DoD "appropriations" bill--will pass in Senate.

Huh?

Apparently, you are claiming that the approximately 4% of GDP that federal expenditures have increased under Obama has gone primarily to defense spending. It would be interesting to see where those trillions of dollars of alleged defense spending have gone over the last 2 or so years.

And, btw, the only way that you can get to 1/3 of the budget being defense spending is if you ignore a good chunk of it, such as, for example, entitlements spending, along, possibly with Obama's stimulus money as was as TARP.

Joe: What those "cuts" will look like passed on to your children is this: teachers pissing and moaning in class about how put upon they are, and even more slacking in terms of papers not assigned and not graded.

One of the biggest liberals in my former high school taught a foreign language. That department used workbooks which went with the text. His theory was that students got out of it what they put into it. He only graded the workbooks to see if all the questions were answered, not if they were correct. He loved to show movies and surf the Internet while students were doing so. That department used a Spanish I textbook for Spanish 1 and 2. They used a Spanish II book for Spanish 3 and 4. Nobody wanted to teach either Spanish 5 or AP Spanish. No wonder.

The official DoD budget has been reported as 20-25 % over the last few years (and Obama increased slightly). Do some research into the actual spending on military-related projects, however, Herr Doktor Profesor Hayden. You will note that the military also routinely draws from the those mysterious "discretionary" and "other mandatory" chunks of the Fed. pie (like emergency stuff--more drones, etc), which together total over 30% (more than half goes to military, at least). The military accounts for at least 1/3 of total Fed budget--that's a conservative estimate. Some say closer to 50%.

At the same time in 2009 that federal law enforcement agencies (the ATF, the DOJ, and presumably Janet Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security) were creating the operation that led to the executive branch being the largest gun smuggler in the Southwest, the president’s team was crafting the rhetoric to sell the crisis they were creating.

On television, in various news outlets, and even in a joint appearance with Mexican President Felipe Calderon, Obama pushed the 90 percent lie, implying that 90% of the guns recovered in Mexican cartel violence came from U.S. gun shops.....We know that of the 7,900 weapons (just under 8 percent of the guns captured from cartels) that came from gun shops in the United States, about 2,000 of them were the result of Gunwalker.

Yes figures the socialists would whine about one of the few Federal expenditures that is actually Constitutionally based and which actually achieves its stated end-state: The best Military on the planet.